This petition is to express discontent with having an AI bot, "Cornelius", automatically sent to students' phone numbers without warning or consent. Considering the many issues with AI, ranging from costs to personal security to environmental impact, and how the ethics of AI use is such a hot topic nowadays, it must've been understood that not everyone would appreciate this. Many students have issues with AI usage, and many have made it a point to stop using tools that utilize AI, such as turning away from Google and boycotting ChatGPT whenever possible. This petition disagrees with the choice to send "Cornelius" out, for various reasons.

One main concern with "Cornelius" is the security of students' private information and data. Since we weren't given proper notice or allowed to consent to our phone numbers being given to the AI, is it already collecting data on us? How will this data be used? The giveaway also prompts concern considering it encourages everyone to text back, which certainly gives out our data. As college students, who are notoriously broke, incentivizing use of an involuntary bot using expensive technology is certain to work wonders. This will most likely return a lot of data from a lot of students, without giving anyone a chance to actually understand what that data will be used for.

Another concern we have is that other AI models such as ChatGPT have recently come under fire for mimicking humans a bit too well and becoming replacements for regular human social interaction. By personifying "Cornelius" with a name and a voice and marketing it to college students, specifically those who may be new to campus and have a lot of questions (consequently also a group that may be struggling with making friends now that they're at college), this may have a negative result. It would be one thing to introduce a bot impersonally by simply saying its services are available, but to write out a message crafting the AI as a being capable of "supporting" you and "checking in" with you is definitely a concern in this regard. AI will never be a replacement for human connection, and will especially never be a replacement for therapy, which is what this kind of language suggests it may be used for. We should be encouraging students to seek help through real people with real human understanding of human problems, not support from an AI bot.

Furthermore, the expected users of this AI bot have no way of knowing how much it has been tested and how accurate it will be. Early forms of ChatGPT and other models were littered with inaccurate information and straight-up lies. Will "Cornelius" be the same, or has it been updated to reflect the improved (but still not perfect) accuracy of current AI models? One specific concern is that if ChatGPT is presented with a query it cannot answer accurately, it will lie so that it can still appear helpful. If "Cornelius" can't find the answer to a question, will it return a lie? If it does lie, how will that misinformation be corrected and rectified? Additionally, if the point was simply to make it easier for UNL students to find answers to their questions, why not simply update the existing UNL websites? Aside from how generally complicated it can be sometimes to find the source of specific information on UNL's websites, there are dozens of links therein that send the user to pages that no longer exist or return errors, for example. Why is the attention on implementing an unreliable AI bot rather than fixing the main sources of information?

Yet another concern is where the money is coming from to host this bot. Considering the university has made a big point recently that we must cut down on costs, it seems like the money being spent on AI would find much better use elsewhere. Saying we need to save money on programs that are actually providing students with vital education and then turning around and spending money on something that is ultimately not necessary doesn't seem like good practices. 

Join us in holding UNL accountable to act responsibly and prioritize student welfare over unchecked technological deployments by providing answers to these questions and more. Transparency, student privacy and security, and a balanced financial approach must be the cornerstone of any decision that directly impacts the student body. Please sign this petition to demand that the University of Nebraska–Lincoln listen to these concerns and make changes to the AI bot "Cornelius".